is this simply because the economy has been improving and consumer spending is amped up? > >that is certainly part of it. as we probably all know, the story since the recession has been that the high end has recovered very well and that discounters have recovered very well. and that is particularly true in malls. the big fortress high end malls. they've gotten a lot of high end tenants. people are willing to spend again and that's certainly making them experience a kind of nice resurgence. > >what metrics do you look at? how much of the growth are they seeing? > >the real concrete ones that we can look at are the 9 biggest publicly traded mall reits. > >real estate investment trusts that own malls. > >exactly. the big mall owners in the country. they have to report their occupancy. and the average occupancy of the 9 largest ones currently stands at 93 percent which is nearly an all time high. some of them are as high 99% leased which is pretty remarkable. > >and foot traffic too? spending? those are all on the up and up? > >well there is a catch---so foot traffic is actua